Sean Paul Murphy, Writer

Sean Paul Murphy, Writer
Sean Paul Murphy, Storyteller

Tuesday, August 4, 2026

Escape From Hollywood | A Screenwriter's Story

Anyone who has been following me online will have noticed I have been toying quite a bit with AI creatively. 

Although I remain completely dismissive of the quality of AI writing, I believe AI generates excellent music. I attribute this ability to the mathematical nature of music. I have been using AI to realize the songs I have been writing since the early 1980s. I am also using AI to create the lyric videos for my songs. I have been surprised by the rapid advancement of the quality of the images and animation. It has reached a point where it could be taken seriously.

I made a few semi-narrative short films for the amusement of my wife Deborah and myself. She always dreamed of being a pioneer in the Old West and I was able to make that dream come true through the magic of AI. I can't post that film here because some of our adventures were of a romantic nature perhaps more fitting for Cinemax After Dark. (I got a community standards warning on the film on YouTube and quickly removed it.)

I was able to transport us back in time again in the music video for my wife's upcoming song Remember Eve.  In the music video, a modern woman, modeled on Deborah at the age of thrity-three, looks back with longing on Eve's innocent life in the Garden of Eden before she ate the apple.  Eve is modeled on Deborah at the age of eighteen. Fortunately, she had long hair at that time! I, of course, play both Adam and the dullard modern husband.   Here's the video:

That video gave Deborah an idea.  We could start a business where we transport people back to a time they longed to visit. To test the concept, Deborah approached our friend Trish, a longtime film business persona. Trish was game. She said she wanted to be a writer in the 1920s. I suggested being a screenwriter at Paramount (where she once worked on the lot) during the late silent period. Deborah asked who her period celebrity crush was. She said young Gary Cooper. With those details in hand, I created the story you'll find in the film.

Here's the logline:  A Hollywood screenwriter finds herself entangled in behind the scenes romance and politics during the making of a 1926 silent film directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Clara Bow and an ambitious, up and coming Gary Cooper. Meanwhile, her friend F. Scott Fitzgerald, who is slumming in Hollywood for quick cash, advises her to leave the movie business and write a novel instead.

I know a number of AI generators will create two minute plus sequences of a film at one time. I've seen some amazing action sequences created that way, but I wanted a more human story.  To do so, I felt I needed to keep more of the process in my own hands. Here's my workflow.

I storyboarded the film shot by shot by creating 89 master still images in ChatGPT. I later created some additional submaster stills in Grok.  Using those stills, I created 94 video clip using Grok. Because of the subject matter, I opted to make a silent film. (I was also afraid of the voice acting, but it would have been adequate.) The film was a very talky silent film.  I generated 66 title images. I created all of the music tracks on Suno. The song, Red Hill Way, was written by Deborah and myself.  The French translation was generated by ChatGPT.  I edited the film in Premiere Pro. Total time invested: Less than 30 hours. Total budget: Maybe $50 more than my normal monthly AI subscription budget.

Here's the film:

 

First, I want to report that Trish loved the final project, and, fortunately, allowed us to post it publicly. I'm glad she did.  I am quite proud of the film. So is Deborah.

I must say that I enjoyed the making of this film more than the making of twelve of my fourteen produced features. Normally, I am only a writer. This process allowed me to immerse myself in all aspects of production: Writing, direction, cinematography (I have a cameo as the camera operator), casting, wardrobe, locations, set decoration, music supervision and post. A filmmaker friend of mine was depressed by what he saw.  He said it would be end of writing and directing. I strongly disagreed. I reminded him that wrote and director the film. The same skills were needed. Only the tools changed.

Hey, I understand his attitude.  In my day job, I initally resisted non-linear digital entity. Then I embraced it wholeheartedly. I'm glad I did. If I hadn't I would have been out of the film editing business by the early nineties.

Adapt or die...

(I see an AI feature in my future.)

Be sure to check out my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God, originally published by Touchpoint Press. It is my true story of first faith and first love and how the two became almost fatally intertwined.



Here are some sample chapters of The Promise:

Chapter 7 - Mission Accomplished
Chapter 15 - Quarter To Midnight

Be sure to check out my novel Chapel Street. It tells the story of a young man straddling the line between sanity and madness while battling a demonic entity that has driven his family members to suicide for generations. It was inspired by an actual haunting my family experienced.



Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:


Read about the true haunting that inspired the novel here:
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 1, An Introduction
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 2, The House
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 3, This Is Us
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 4, Arrival
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 5, Methodology
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 6, Clara's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 7, Clara's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 8, My Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 9, My Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 10, My Tale, Pt. 3
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 11, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 12, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 13, John's Tale, Pt. 1 
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 14, John's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 15, Come Inside!
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 16, Marion's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 17, Marion's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 18, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 19, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 20, Lisa's Tale
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 21, Recap, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 22, Recap, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 23, Recap, Pt. 3

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Sunday, May 17, 2026

Writer Tip #44: Pictures

Buster Keaton, Sherlock Jr.

I recently heard a comedian say that the people who use the word "films" were more pretentious than the people who use the word "movies." Then he added, "The people who say pictures were the most pretentious of all."

I disagree.

In normal conversations, I suppose I say movies most of the time. However, when I talk to people about screenwriting, I always try to use the word pictures.

To be honest, I guess I started saying pictures out of pretentiousness. It seemed like the cool, insider thing to do. Whenever I saw a movie about filmmaking or set at a movie studio, the people always referred to movies as pictures. Now, I say it for a different reason -- especially with emerging screenwriters.

More and more people seek fame and fortune through screenwriting, and quite a niche industry has sprung up to feed and exploit them. There is no shortage of readers, advisors and consultants. There are endless books and webpages (including mine, I suppose). And let's not forget the contests. How many screenwriting competitions are there today? Don't bother trying to count them. By the time you finish, new ones have already sprung up.

I have a lot of problems with certain consultants, books and contests. Not just because I think they are exploitative. I have a deeper more fundamental problem with them: They look at the screenplay itself as the end product. It is not. The end product is a motion picture. A script can be exciting, emotionally compelling, grammatically correct and win every imaginable contest, but it isn't truly finished until it is made into a motion picture or television show.

I'm O-G, so let me jump back to the days of film.  During the sound era, 24 frames of film passed through the projector every second. That's 1,440 images a minute. A two hour movie consisted of 172,000 images. Or, dare I say, pictures.  Our job is to help create those pictures.

We're in the picture business. Not the paper business. Not the .pdf business. And not the word business.

We're in the picture business.

Too many emerging screenwriters forget that. They think it's about the words. The words are important, but only if they create pictures.

Because I straddle the world of books and movies, I talk to a lot of novelists.  Many of them want to become screenwriters simply because they think writing a screenplay is easier than writing a novel. They think all you do is write a scene heading, a brief description of the setting, then get on with the dialogue.

They're doomed -- unless they set that dialogue in the context of pictures. 

If you keep reminding yourself that you are in the picture business, it will change the way you write for the better. It will force you to consider what you want your audience (the reader) to see in every scene. That's cinema.

When you start doing that, you're finally in the picture business.

I wish I learned that lesson earlier!


Other Writing Tips:


Check out my novel Chapel Street on Amazon now:


Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer here:

  

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Thursday, February 26, 2026

OPE A GHOST PODCAST

The Ope, A Ghost podcast discussed the Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue in their episode 67 - Real Haunted Houses III.

The Ope A Ghost podcast discusses all things paranormal and spook.  It is hosted by Heaven and Jonathan. Heaven was the one who brought our haunting to the podcast after reading my blogs.

Here's the episode. The discussion of our haunting begins around one hour and three minutes into the show.

 

Be sure to check out my novel Chapel Street. It was inspired by the haunting. It is now available on Kindle Unlimited.



Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:


Read about the true haunting that inspired the novel here:
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 1, An Introduction
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 2, The House
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 3, This Is Us
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 4, Arrival
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 5, Methodology
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 6, Clara's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 7, Clara's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 8, My Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 9, My Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 10, My Tale, Pt. 3
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 11, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 12, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 13, John's Tale, Pt. 1 
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 14, John's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 15, Come Inside!
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 16, Marion's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 17, Marion's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 18, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 19, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 20, Lisa's Tale
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 21, Recap, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 22, Recap, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 23, Recap, Pt. 3

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Saturday, October 4, 2025

My Films Now Available Free on Tubi

For years the majority of my films were locked behind streaming paywalls. Now most of them can be found for free on Tubi.

Most of my produced films are faith based. I always found it ridiculous that those films were locked behind the pay wall of a Christian streaming website. The avowed purpose of these films was to reach people for the Lord, yet the only people who could see them were already Christians. I doubt very few, if any, non-Christians subscribed to the PureFlix streaming service.  I deal with some of these paradoxes of the faith based film business in my earlier blog Building The Faith Based Ghetto. Check it out.

Well, regardless of the why (money), I am glad to see the films publicly available again for the general public! I am amused to see some of the films have new names: The Encounter Paradise Lost became Paradise Lost The Encounter, and Holyman Undercover became Amish Undercover. There's also new artwork for most of the films.

HIDDEN SECRETS

2006 · 1 hr 30 min
TV-14 Comedy Drama Romance

Synopsis:  The funeral of a hometown hero reunites a group of old friends with hidden secrets and reignites a spark that puts a current relationship to the test.

Audio Languages: English
Subtitles: English
Starring:John Schneider David A.R. White Tracy Melchior Reginald VelJohnson Staci Keanan Corin Nemec
Directed by: Carey Scott

I wrote a series of blogs about the making of Hidden Secrets.  You can read them here:

Hidden Secrets, Revealed, Part 1, Pre-History
Hidden Secrets, Revealed, Part 2, First Contact
Hidden Secrets, Revealed, Part 3, The Writing
Hidden Secrets, Revealed, Part 4, Production
Hidden Secrets, Revealed, Part 5, Aftermath

Check out the movie:  HIDDEN SECRETS

In Profit:  Not sure.  Should be.  Long story....

SARAH'S CHOICE

2009 · 1 hr 27 min
TV-14 Drama

Synopsis: Sarah is considering an abortion. Before she makes her decision, she is presented with visions causing her to think about the impact on her future.

Audio Languages: English
Subtitles: English
Starring:Rebecca St. James Dick Van Patten Staci Keanan Charlene Tilton Andrea Logan
Directed by: Chad Kapper

I wrote a series of blogs about the making of Sarah's Choice.  You can read them here:


Watch the movie: SARAH'S CHOICE

In Profit:  Yes.

AMISH UNDERCOVER

This film was previously released as Holyman Undercover.

2010 · 1 hr 30 min
TV-14 Comedy
Synopsis:  An Amish farm boy heads to Los Angeles to be a missionary, but instead finds fame and fortune in Hollywood by acting in a top-rated television show.

I wrote a series of blogs about the making of "Amish Undercover." You can read them here:


Check out the movie:  AMISH UNDERCOVER

In Profit: No.

THE ENCOUNTER

2010 · 1 hr 31 min
TV-PG Drama

Synopsis: A road closure forces five strangers to come together at a remote roadside eatery whose omniscient owner may be Jesus Christ.

I have written a series of blogs about the making of The Encounter.  You can read them here:


Check out the movie:  THE ENCOUNTER

In Profit: Yes.


RUN ON

2011 · 1 hr 30 min
TV-14 Comedy

Synopsis: The prodigal journeys of three Christian performers weave together seamlessly to write the oldest story of all: the futility of trying to outrun God.

Audio Languages: English
Subtitles: English
Starring: David A.R. White Brad Stine Tommy Blaze
Directed by: Joseph Davis

I have written a blog about the making of Run On.  Check it out here:


Check out the film: RUN ON

In Profit: No.

BROTHER WHITE

2012 · 1 hr 31 min
TV-PG  Comedy Drama

An associate pastor at a California mega church becomes a fish out of water when he takes the helm of a modest church in a tough Atlanta neighborhood.

Audio Languages: English
Subtitles: English
Starring: David A.R. White Andrea Logan Anna Margaret Bruce Davison Jackée Harry Brad Heller
Directed by: Brian Herzlinger

I didn't write about the making of this film. It was originally written as a feature length pilot for a one camera comedy cable series for UpTV. However, at the last minute, the production company, which controlled certain aspects of the distribution, had the script rewritten by the director to make the film more of a drama and less of a comedy since Christian comedy doesn't sell.  As a result, the final film is neither fish nor fowl. The plot was too corny to sustain the weight of the drama without the leavening of the comedy.

Check out the film: BROTHER WHITE

In Profit: Probably no. I don't think the production company is, but I don't know about the cable network.

MARRIAGE RETREAT

2011 · 1 hr 24 min
TV-G  Comedy Romance Drama

Synopsis: A retreat in the mountains for a group of friends winds up putting their marriages under a microscope for a look at how far apart they’ve drifted.

Subtitles: English

This film, inspired by the film Couples Retreat, was originally intended to be a broad, goofy faith based comedy. However, much like the previous film Brother White, the production company got cold feet and rewrote the film to de-emphasis the comedy and up the drama since Christian comedy doesn't sell. The result was an unhappy production and difficult post production.  I heard star Jeff Fahey was upset when he got to the set because the script was so different. Supposedly he said it was a "bait and switch."  God bless him!  Personally, I believe I contributed more to the final film as the editor than as a writer.

The director did not use his real name on the final release.

Check out the film:  MARRIAGE RETREAT

In Profit:  No.  Once when I asked the accountant when she thought the film would be in profit, she just laughed in response.

THE ENCOUNTER PARADISE LOST

2012 · 1 hr 50 min
TV-14  Drama

Synopsis: Seven years after the most devastating tsunami in Thailand, six strangers find themselves trapped in a beach resort on the brink of a hurricane.

Subtitles: English


The first Encounter film was the most successful one released by the production company until the God's Not Dead series. A sequel was demanded. Originally, the sequel was going to be a rip-off of The Breakfast Club with Jesus as the instructor discussing issues of faith with the students in detention. However, star David White wanted to flex his action muscles and demanded that the film be about a criminal or a corrupt cop instead. Hence the new approach. The film was shot in Thailand because some members of the production company had shot a previous film there and they wanted to return and see their girlfriends again on an investor's dime. Hence this film, which is elevated by some good performances and scenes.

The director of this film also used an assumed name. Not out of shame. He was a member of the Director's Guild and this was a non-DGA film.

Check out the film:  THE ENCOUNTER PARADISE LOST

In Profit:  No.

REVELATION ROAD: THE BEGINNING OF THE END

2013 · 1 hr 29 min

TV-MA  Action Fantasy

Synopsis: A traveling salesman with a dark past must fight demons, both his own and a murderous biker gang, in his quest to complete his last sale and go home. 

Subtitles: English
Starring: David A.R. White Eric Roberts Brian Bosworth Ray Wise Jen Lilley
Directed by: Gabriel Sabloff

A David A.R. White apocalyptic action film.  If you like them, you'll like this one.


In Profit: Yes.

REVELATION ROAD 2: SEA OF FIRE AND GLASS

2013 · 1 hr 32 min
TV-14  Action Fantasy

Synopsis: The continued epic journey of traveling salesman Josh McManus, who becomes a warrior on the road back home to his wife and daughter.

Subtitles: English
Starring: David A.R. White Eric Roberts Brian Bosworth Ray Wise Jen Lilley
Directed by :Gabriel Sabloff

This film and the previous one were essentially one movie with a few additional sequences shot later. A decision was made to split the film into two.


In Profit: Yes.

THE BLACK RIDER

2014 · 1 hr 39 min
TV-14 Action Drama Fantasy

Synopsis:  In the wake of the Rapture, a drifter finds himself in a wasteland full of marauders. With the aid of a beautiful survivor, he'll discover the truth.

Subtitles: English
Starring: James Denton David A.R. White Kevin Sorbo Brian Bosworth Hilty Bowen
Directed by: Gabriel Sabloff

When two Revelation Road films aren't enough, you make a third one. There is also an upcoming streaming series. Keep an eye out for it.

Check out the film: THE BLACK RIDER

In Profit: No.

My feature length documentary Sacred Ground: The Battle For Mount Auburn Cemetery should be premiering on Tubi and other AVOD services soon.  Here's the trailer:

 

I hope my other films will soon join them.  We're working on a new distribution deal for my first and favorite feature 21 Eyes, now known as Do You See What I See?  Here's the teaser:

 

Now I have to talk to the production company behind my film Open My Eyes. That should be available too.  Here's the trailer:

 

Be sure to check out my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God, published by TouchPoint Press. It is my true story of first faith and first love and how the two became almost fatally intertwined.



Here are some sample chapters of The Promise:

Chapter 7 - Mission Accomplished
Chapter 15 - Quarter To Midnight

Be sure to check out my novel Chapel Street. It tells the story of a young man straddling the line between sanity and madness while battling a demonic entity that has driven his family members to suicide for generations. It was inspired by an actual haunting my family experienced.

You can buy the Kindle and paperback at Amazon and the Nook, paperback and hardcover at Barnes & Noble.


Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:


Read about the true haunting that inspired the novel here:
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 1, An Introduction
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 2, The House
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 3, This Is Us
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 4, Arrival
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 5, Methodology
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 6, Clara's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 7, Clara's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 8, My Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 9, My Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 10, My Tale, Pt. 3
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 11, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 12, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 13, John's Tale, Pt. 1 
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 14, John's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 15, Come Inside!
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 16, Marion's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 17, Marion's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 18, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 19, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 20, Lisa's Tale
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 21, Recap, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 22, Recap, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 23, Recap, Pt. 3

Follow me on Twitter: SeanPaulMurphy
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Monday, September 15, 2025

PARADISE LOST released

My latest album Paradise Lost has just been released.  It is available on all major streaming services.

This is an album I didn't intend to write. I only had two future albums in mind. I wanted to write a concept album as a companion piece to my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God. I also intended to write another concept album based on the initial emails between my ex-girlfriend of mine, Mandy, who was the subject of my first album The Elusive Farm Girl, and myself. We met online and I found the way we got to know each other online through email was sweet and fascinating. 

I was inspired to write this album when I heard the 1982 hit by Charlene called Never Been To Me. It brought back a very strong memory of my relationship with my first girlfriend Kathy. We had, in my opinion, a very strong and idyllic relationship. One afternoon, while we were relaxing in her dorm room, that song came on the radio. When it was was over, she said, "I've never been to me either." I was stunned by her words. I thought she was as happy as I was. This was the first indication I had that she suffered from an existential uneasiness that I didn't know how to help her with.  I didn't know what to say, but I knew those words were a harbinger of doom for us.

I developed that memory into the title song Paradise Lost. I loved the song so I decided to build an album around it. When I started the album, I was finishing my "comedy" album Tall Tales & Wishful Thinking. I wanted to follow it up with a more serious album. My most successful album to date was my second one Breakup City, which consisted of raw contemporaneous breakup songs. I decided to essentially make this album Breakup City 2.

Breakup City was about my breakup with my girlfriend Kathy. However, I couldn't make all of the songs about that relationship since my projected companion piece to my memoir would cover that same territory. I didn't want this album to step on that album. I decided to deal with multiple relationships in Paradise Lost.

Although nowadays music fans tend to listen to individual songs rather than complete albums, I still think in terms of albums. Therefore, I wanted to show the transition from one relationship that ended in heartbreak to another one that also ended badly. I felt I needed some transitional songs happy songs as a break between the relationships. I wrote a few songs about Kathy and intended to spend the rest of the album with Mandy. However, I couldn't transition to meeting Mandy because I planned to use that material for my email romance album. So I added two upbeat songs based on my relationship with a third woman I will called Stacey, then one upbeat song about Mandy before bringing on the heartbreak.

Still, it took a long time for me to finalize a song list I was happy with. I wanted to add some emotional nuance. I've learned that breakups are not always a result of the specific actions of a couple in their time and place. Often breakups are a byproduct of previous traumas and expectations you bring into the relationship. I wrote a song along those lines that I considered the centerpiece of the second half of the album. It was an extremely personal "she said" song based on things one of my girlfriends told me. Since her revelations were told to me in confidence, I felt I couldn't release the song without her permission. I sent it to her, and, after much thought, she asked me not to include it. I completely respected her wishes. However, that meant restructuring the album repeatedly and writing some new songs to make an album I thought worked.

Here's the final album. I hope you enjoy it more than I enjoyed living it!

Here's the track listing:

1). PARADISE LOST.  In this song, I recount how my girlfriend's identification with the 1982 Charlene hit Never Been To Me affected our relationship.

 

2).  ALL OF NOTHING. This is perhaps the most self-pitying of my break up songs. Over the years of my first relationship, my identity shifted from Sean to Sean of Sean and Kathy. When she left, I didn't know who I was anymore. I viewed myself as half a person without her.

 

3).  A HUNDRED YEARS.  When Kathy left me, I thought it'd be a hundred years before I could open up my heart again. Actually, it only turned out to be ten years. I literally only went out on one date in the ten years between the time when Kathy left and I first met Mandy.

 

4).  COURAGE.  Narratively, this song is out of order but it works beautifully as a transition from loneliness to taking a chance on a relationship again. Although I executed the song with a female voice, it is based on a poem I wrote to Mandy late in our relationship as I tried to draw her out of her sorrow after her disappointment with another man. (We had a complicated relationship!)

 

5).  STACEY5359.  I actually met Mandy before I met Stacey. Mandy was separated at the time and tried to reconcile with her husband soon after we met. I met Stacey online during that break in our relationship. I have written a number of songs about Stacey which are scattered throughout my albums including Finally Meeting, What If?, Our Secret Love, Windswept Memories, A Friend, Yes, Forever and Cammy, Sweet Cammy. One way or another, those songs all concentrate on the obstacle to our relationship: Technically, she was married. I had never written a song about my attraction toward her and the joy she brought me. Hopefully, this song alleviates that imbalance.

 

6).  COUNTING THE DAYS. Stacey and I had a long distance online relationship. This is a "she said" song based on a email she sent me prior to her flying to Baltimore to visit me in person. She had quite an erotic imagination, which she gave full reign to in the actual email. I rewrote this song quite a few times to tone it down and make it somewhat acceptable for all ages.

 

7). SACRED VOWS. Now I transition back to Mandy permanently for the rest of the album. This song is essentially a combination of two contemporaneous poems I wrote about her. One poem was about her eyes and one was about her voice -- two aspects of her that I found quite appealing.

 

8). FOR YOU TONIGHT. This song is also based on a poem I wrote in June or July of 1996 about my then-girlfriend Mandy called Sojourning. Calling her my then girlfriend at that moment is perhaps being overly optimistic. She was withdrawing from me after a period of intimacy. Her withdrawal was very painful to me, but our relationship would rebound. We hadn't even reached our doomed engagement yet! (The end of our engagement would be covered, from her perspective, in the next song)

 

9).  A NEW START. This is another "she said" song from Mandy's perspective based on a email she sent me after we broke up. During almost our entire relationship, she was wrestling with her feelings for me and a guy who lived in California. After her final break with the California guy, I proposed and she said yes, but it was not meant to be.

 

10). STAY TRUE TO US.  This song was based on a contemporaneous poem I wrote to Mandy after the collapse of our brief engagement. I was heartbroken, but I still had hope it would work out. That's what this song is about.

11). YOU WERE THE ONE.  After the publication of my memoir, I considered a follow-up covering the years I was dating Mandy. I had saved all of our emails and scanned them into a series of pdf files. Mandy and I were still friends, and when I mentioned that I still had the emails, she asked to read them. This "she said" song is based on an email she sent me after she re-read our correspondence. I think it is kind of message every "reject" longs to receive from an ex.

 

12).  DIAMONDS IN THE SAND. The final song on this album exemplified the spirit of my earlier album Look Back in Love. My youthful expectations gave me the impression that any romantic relationship that didn't end in marriage was a failure. I no longer feel that way. Now I look back in love. I am grateful for the love and affection the wonderful women in my life shared with me, albeit often more briefly than I desired. I was blessed to know all of them. In the context of this album, the song is about Mandy, but it equally true of Kathy and Stacey. They were all diamonds in the sand.

    

I hope you enjoy the songs and the album. You can listen to it on these and other streaming services:

Spotify
YouTube Music
Amazon Music
Apple Music
iHeart Radio
Pandora


Be sure to check out my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God, published by TouchPoint Press. It is my true story of first faith and first love and how the two became almost fatally intertwined.



Here are some sample chapters of The Promise:


Be sure to check out my novel Chapel Street. It tells the story of a young man straddling the line between sanity and madness while battling a demonic entity that has driven his family members to suicide for generations. It was inspired by an actual haunting my family experienced.

You can buy the Kindle and paperback at Amazon and the Nook, paperback and hardcover at Barnes & Noble.


Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:


Read about the true haunting that inspired the novel here:
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 1, An Introduction
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 2, The House
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 3, This Is Us
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 4, Arrival
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 5, Methodology
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 6, Clara's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 7, Clara's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 8, My Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 9, My Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 10, My Tale, Pt. 3
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 11, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 12, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 13, John's Tale, Pt. 1 
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 14, John's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 15, Come Inside!
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 16, Marion's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 17, Marion's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 18, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 19, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 20, Lisa's Tale
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 21, Recap, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 22, Recap, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 23, Recap, Pt. 3

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